A Mac users look back on the last decade! Tim Robertson looks at his top Mac stories of the last decade, plus feedback and Mac news.
Archive for » December, 2009 «
A Mac Users View of the last Decade – OWC Radio #2
Thursday, December 31st, 2009 | Author: OWC Tim
Category: OWC Radio
2009 – The OWC Year in Review
Thursday, December 31st, 2009 | Author: OWC Michael
The end of 2009 is upon us. In a few short hours we’ll be counting down to the new year with family and friends and it just seems appropriate to look back upon the last year with a little nostalgia. It’s amazing how far we’ve come.
2009 brought with it a new look and organization to the macsales.com website. We took your (our faithful customers’) feedback and we listened. The site is now easier to navigate, easier to checkout, and all wrapped in a pretty cool space-themed package.
The ways in which you can interact with us has also made some amazing progress in the past year. 2009 marked the first full year of the OWC Blog and the first full year of our installation videos being available on YouTube both consistently gaining in viewership and popularity. You keep reading and watching and we promise to keep producing them. 2009 saw the beginnings of @macsales on Twitter and our #TFTL (that’s Thanks for the Love) initiative, our launch of the OWC Facebook page, and just recently the start of our installation videos available on iTunes, as well as the “OWC Radio: by humans for humans” podcast hosted by Tim Robertson.
OWC also opened the Computer & iPod Upgrades & Service Center, the only iPod and iPhone repair service available in McHenry County, IL. The drop off service center, offers next business day diagnostic estimates for expert repair and upgrade services on iPods, iPhones, and both Mac and PC desktop and notebook computers.
And speaking of new structures, on October 19, 2009, OWC furthered their green initiative by becoming the first technology manufacturer/distributor in the U.S. to be 100% on-site wind powered by our new wind turbine.
Category: green, Random Thoughts & Topics
Get yourself a better view for the new year.
Thursday, December 31st, 2009 | Author: OWC Chris S.
Studies have shown that having more screen real estate on your computer helps increase productivity. Even laptops and computers with built-in displays usually have an option for connecting a second display, expanding the computer’s desktop and giving you more room to work. And for those of you who don’t generally do “work” on your computer, let me offer up this lightly less-responsible bit of motivation: multiple large displays look cool.
Frankly, I view it from both sides of the coin. I think had only a single display on my desk during my first year or so with OWC. For the vast majority of my time here, I’ve had at least two displays, and I bumped it up to three earlier this year when I got moved to a Mac Pro for video production, so I know about the productivity benefits having lots of screen real estate. Let me tell you, I go crazy when sitting at my favorite beverage dispensing establishment, trying to juggle emails, chats, downloads, and surfing on my MacBook Pro. Even with OS additions like Spaces, there’s nothing compared to the convenience of having everything all visible at once.
But there are also times where a multiple display setup isn’t always convenient. Sometimes you don’t have an available display connector. Other times, you just don’t have the desk space to hold an extra monitor. In that case, the trick is to get the best single monitor you can at the best possible price.
That’s why I’m glad to mention that OWC has a great price on the Acer B243HL bmdrz 24″ Widescreen White LED Backlit TFT LCD Display. This display is a great option, regardless of whether you’re pairing it up with another display (stand-alone or built-in) or using it by itself. Article Continues…
Introducing OWC Radio
Wednesday, December 30th, 2009 | Author: OWC Tim
Today, Other World Computing has launched a new audio podcast, OWC Radio. Hosted by Tim Robertson, the first episode features an interview with TUAW.com tech writer Steve Sande.
OWC Radio Host Tim Robertson (OWC Tim) has been a long time staple in Macintosh podcasting, having hosted the MyMac.com podcast for the last five years. One of the original Mac podcasters, Tim will bring his passion for the Macintosh and iPhone to the OWC Radio podcast every week, taking a look at the biggest Mac stories on the web.
OWC Radio will be an ongoing audio program, free of charge, that you can subscribe to in iTunes. Or, if you prefer, click here to listen to the show right in your web browser.
Please be sure to follow OWC Radio and show host Tim Robertson on Twitter at www.twitter.com/owcradio, and send feedback to podcast@macsales.com.
Category: OWC Radio
OWC Install Videos now in iTunes
Tuesday, December 29th, 2009 | Author: OWC Tim
When I was a young child, my father worked in an auto-parts store, and he would regularly bring home broken or defective auto-parts for me to take apart. Most of the time, these parts were dirty, oily, and smelly things that a day before had been on a car or truck. I didn’t care, I just wanted to figure out how things worked. And I loved the feel of breaking loose a bolt or screw using my dad’s tools.
That passion is still there, but rather than broken and dirty auto-parts, I take apart computer gear. I love upgrading older hardware to run faster, have more storage, or in some cases, a faster and more powerful CPU.
There are times, however, when those of us who enjoy doing our own computer upgrades have need of expert advise. And that’s where the OWC Install Videos come in!
Starting now, you can subscribe to our OWC TV – Installation Series in iTunes! By subscribing to this video podcast feed, iTunes will automatically download the installation videos to your hard drive when we add them. And because we have a huge online catalog of installation videos, we will be adding new videos every week to iTunes.
Each of our videos in iTunes are in high quality QuickTime format, usually h.264 and High Definition (HD).
Subscribe to OWC TV – Installation Series, free of charge! And keep your eyes peeled to the OWC Blogs for even more news about exciting OWC content coming to iTunes very soon!
Category: OWC Radio
Don’t Let the Cold Put A Chill On Your Hard Drive
Tuesday, December 29th, 2009 | Author: OWC Michael
With the cold weather upon us, it makes sense to touch on a topic that few consider…bringing a hard drive up to room temperature – or at least operating temperature parameters – before using.
Any fluid can freeze if it gets cold enough, including the lubricant inside your hard drive. When the hard drive tries to spin up the platters will not turn because the fluid isn’t viscous enough to allow the platters to spin at their proper speed. As a result, you’re looking at a drive that won’t boot up at all, or worse, is spinning at the wrong speeds and possibly corrupting the data on the drive.
An equally important factor is condensation. Ever pull an ice cold beer out of the cooler on a warm day? What happens? That’s right! Condensation forms on the outside of the bottle. Now think about that hard drive you just pulled in from the cold… exactly. Water and electronic components just don’t mix. If you’re receiving a brand new hard drive that has been sitting out in the freezing cold, its best to let it come up to temperature in the original shipping container so that the increase in temperature is gradual.
So, exciting as receiving your new drive is, we wouldn’t suggest immediately opening and plugging it into a NewerTech Voyager or USB Universal Drive Adapter while in a “frozen” state. The same factors also apply when bringing in your laptop from the cold to protect the hard drive inside.
Now, keep in mind, we’re talking very cold weather here. Most modern hard drives have a low operating temperature of 0 degrees Celsius (32 degrees Fahrenheit), aka. the freezing point of water. And the vast majority are safe for storage in even colder temperatures. We’re also talking about platter-based hard disks. A Solid State Drive (SSD) with no moving parts has a much greater operating temperature range, as low as -55 degrees Celsius (-67 degrees Fahrenheit). So, if you’re planning an Arctic Expedition anytime soon – SSD would definitely be the way to go.
Category: Tech Tips
Apple Tablet Just A Touch Too Much?
Monday, December 28th, 2009 | Author: OWC Grant
Nothing like an impending Apple announcement to get multitudes – from the casual observer to the rabid supporter – talking about it. And hey, since we fall somewhere in that range, it was time for us to weigh in with our thoughts on the Apple Tablet Mac.
Now, some sharp readers here may remember a post by OWC Michael in early December about how the Mac tablet is already shipping. While there was a bit of nudge nudge wink wink in that post, the truth remains today as it did back then:
If you want a pen based Mac tablet computer running OS X that you can draw and write on, our Modbook or Modservice gives you a full computing experience and then some.
Meanwhile, we’re hearing there is a conference center being rented for end of January to discuss a device that will maybe have a 7-10″ screen and cost around $1,000.
And that the device will also be an e-book reader to take some thunder away from the Kindle.
Perhaps the best terms I’ve heard used to describe this impending announcement is an iPhone on steroids or a ginormous iPod. That doesn’t exactly sound like a computer to me. Desktop and notebooks are what I define as a computer. They run business oriented apps (WP, speadsheets, databases, graphics, etc.). You start going down to a netbook…and now perhaps a new term for this new category – webpad – and the lines of what truly can be called a computer – or at least one that can be easily used to run the aforementioned apps – are getting blurry to my old eyes. And we won’t even touch on the subject of one fingered typing…
All of the pre-announcement hype seems to be a Touch Too Much…heavy sounding for sure, but when it comes down to it, the proposed product appears to be a glorified iPod Touch with a bigger screen. Certainly not the Holy Grail, but if it features a full sized QWERTY keyboard for us Baby Boomers, I might just get off my Grinch and proclaim it a highly worthy product.
Now, I’ll be the first to admit any shortcomings on my prediction of this impending product being just a bigger iPod Touch. After all, it seems many other “experts” were off on their original iPhone predictions.
In the end though, I can’t help thinking about what George Costanza would say to impending product announcements.
Welcome to OWC Radio – OWC Radio #1
Friday, December 25th, 2009 | Author: OWC Tim
The Other World Computing podcast kicks off with host Tim Robertson talking about the Mac news of the day, driving without window washing fluid, some software that turned free, and an interview with The Unofficial Apple Weblog’s own Steven Sande
Category: OWC Radio
